WASHINGTON — An Atlas 5 successfully launched April 28 the long-delayed first set of operational Project Kuiper broadband satellites for Amazon.
An Atlas 5 551 lifted off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station at 7:01 p.m. Eastern on a mission designated KA-01. United Launch Alliance reported a little more than 90 minutes later that the 27 Kuiper satellites on board had deployed from the Centaur upper stage into low Earth orbit.
The launch took place with a degree of secrecy normally associated with national security rather than commercial launches. ULA ended its webcast shortly after separation of the Centaur upper stage four and a half minutes after liftoff, providing only limited updates online afterwards at the request of the customer. A flight profile for the mission published by ULA before the launch listed no milestones after the end of the Centaur’s first burn, such as any additional burns and payload deployment.
In a social media post nearly seven hours after launch, Andy Jassy, chief executive of Amazon, confirmed that all 27 satellites are working normally after deployment. “While this is the first step in a much longer journey to launch the rest of our low Earth orbit constellation, it represents an incredible amount of invention and hard work,” he wrote. Amazon provided no other immediate comment about the launch.
The launch was previously scheduled for April 9 but scrubbed because of weather. ULA said both the rocket and spacecraft were in good condition, and blamed unspecified range issues for the 19-day delay. There had been rumors of classified activities on the Eastern Range, including the April 25 launch of an Army hypersonic missile, limiting launch activities, although SpaceX was able to conduct several Falcon 9 launches between the two Atlas attempts.
The satellites are the first operational spacecraft for Project Kuiper, a constellation planned to have 3,236 satellites in low Earth orbit to provide broadband services. Amazon launched two prototype Kuiper satellites on another Atlas 5 in October 2023 and later said tests of those satellites were successful.
Amazon, though, is about a year behind schedule in the deployment of Project Kuiper. The company’s Federal Communications Commission license requires it to have half the constellation in orbit by July 2026 with the full constellation in place three years later. Amazon will likely need an extension of at least the 2026 deadline given the delays in deployment.
Most of the Project Kuiper constellation will launch on Ariane 6, New Glenn and Vulcan Centaur rockets, all of which have made their first flights only since the beginning of 2024. Ariane 6 and Vulcan have performed two launches each and New Glenn one to date.
Those vehicles are gradually ramping up their launch rates, limiting their ability to launch Kuiper satellites in the near term. The first Ariane 6 launch of Kuiper satellites is not expected before late this year, and Blue Origin has not disclosed when it expects to start launching Kuiper satellites.
ULA plans to perform several Kuiper launches this year on both Atlas and Vulcan. Tory Bruno, chief executive of ULA, said in March that Vulcan launches of Kuiper satellites could begin as soon as the middle of this year. ULA overall expects to conduct about a dozen launches, split evenly between commercial and national security missions and between Atlas and Vulcan.
At a media roundtable during the 40th Space Symposium April 7, Bruno said late summer was the current target for the first Vulcan launch of Kuiper satellites. He also said ULA may be able to do a second Atlas launch of Kuiper satellites before switching over to Vulcan launches for the Space Force and then Amazon later in the summer.
With this launch, there are seven Atlas launches remaining on contract for Kuiper launches. “I don’t think I’ll get all the Atlases off for them this year,” Bruno said. “I think it’ll be ’26 before we get them all done.”
